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Thursday, March 22, 2012

Sayedee Adjournment
Haider Ali, the prosecutor came to the dais and said that they were unable to produce a witness relating to the Sayedee case before the court. The following exchange took place:

Justice Nizamul Huq: Okay, then you fix the date when it will be possible for you.

Haider Ali: My lord, please fix a date which will be convenient for the Tribunal.

Justice Nizamul Huq: Learned prosecution everyday is convenient for us. You please fix a far date so that it is possible for you to produce witness.

Haider Ali: My Lord, next Tuesday is fine.

Justice Nizamul Huq: We have told you before that you should bring the witnesses to Dhaka and keep then under the custody of Investigation officer. However, 4th March is fixed for further witness in Sayedee’s matter.

Defence contempt of court application
Defence counsel Tajul Islam came to the dais and filed an application for contempt of court against the Daily Janokantha.

Tajul Islam: My lord, the paper published a report that the witness Madhusudan Ghorami said Sayedee was involved in rape during 1971, and that ‘They killed my brother in presence of Saidee.’

'The statements are wrong as well as contemptuous. We have told the tribunal earlier regarding the first statement and now they have done it again,' he said

This relates to the 27th prosecution witness, Saif Hafizur Rahman, the sitting president of
the Narail District Bar Association, had told the court his brother Saif
Mizanur Rahman and two other had been abducted by collaborators and
later tortured and killed. According to the witness, Sayedee
was present in the car that took his elder brother, Pirojpur magistrate
during the Liberation War, to the Baleshwar River. Mizanur Rahman was then stabbed with bayonets and later shot to death. His body was thrown into the river.

The
headline of a news story reporting the witness testimony of Feb 20
published in the daily newspaper on Feb 21 placed Sayedee at the scene of the
murder. The headline reads, 'Paki soldiers stabbed my brother to death
in front of Sayedee'. Tajul Islam said that while the contents of the
story was relatively truthful, the headline was damaging for his client.

"We would suffer prejudice with this kind of headline," he said.

He
also referred to a previous headline from another witness testimony
that alleged Sayedee to have raped Madhusudan Gharami's newly wedded
wife. At that time, Sayedee's defence had merely brought the headline
to the court's attention which Justice Nizamul Huq accepted was wrong.

Tajul Islam said there was a clear trend of maligning his client and was of the opinion that such news was contemptuous.

Justice
Nizamul Huq told the counsel saying that there had been numerous
reports about the tribunal and that the tribunal members had learnt to
grow a thicker skin. "Do you want to set fire to an entire village with this little match stick?"

Tajul
Islam referred to the famous saying of Joseph Goebbels, in charge
of propaganda of Nazi Germany, saying that
"But just like Goebbels had said, if you keep repeating it often
enough, it becomes the truth."

Justice Nizamul Huq said that this matter would be adjourned till Sunday. We are telling Mr Bikash Dutto the opposite party no.2 to be present before the court on Sunday. He will be informed from our office also. Only to be present not to appear before the court.

Privileged communication application
Tajul Islam for the defence came to the dais and prayed for privilege communication of Quamaruzzaman’s matter. The tribunal passed the following order:

This was an application filed by the accused petitioner praying for a direction upon the Jail Authority to allow privileged communication between the accused petitioner and the defence counsel in the jail. Heard Mr. Taiul Islam, the learned Counsel appearing for the accused petitioner and also the learned Prosecutor Mr. Zead A1- Malum.

Mr. Tajul Islam, the learned Counsel submitted that in order to prepare the defence case they need to meet the accused petitioner to go through the allegations made in the formal charge and consult them and that they require to take instruction ftom the accused petitioner for the preparation of the defence case. He further submitted that similar petitions in this Court were allowed with the similar prayer in respect of different accuseds and as such he prayed for similar direction in this respect.

Mr. Zead-Al-Malum, the leamed Prosecutor submitted that for a fair trial the accused counsels may be allowed to take instruction from the accused person in accordance with the Jail Code. He candidly submitted that if the prayer is allowed, that may be subject to the condition of JaiI Code and in that case, he has got flo obiection in the prayer.

We have heard the learned counsel Mr. Tajul lslam for the petitioner and the learned prosecutor Mr. Zead-Al-Malum.

Upon consideration of the fact that similar prayers have been allowed by this Tribunal, we are also inclined to allow this prayer in accordance with the Jail Code on conditions that afly two counsels of the three mentioned here that is Mr. Ehsan Siddiq, Mr. Imtan Siddiq and Mr. Shishir Md. Munir allowed to meet and have discussions with the accused petitioner Mr. Md. Kamrazuaman. Let the Jail Authonty be directed the allow privileged communication of the accused petitionet with his two leamed counsels out of three names given in this order on 03.03.2012, 10.03.2012 and 17.03.2012 from10.00 a.m. to 1.00 p.m. and they will be allowed to consult with the accused petitioner during office hour and this communication of them will be a privileged communication that means nobody will be allowed to be present at the time of communication except the security personnel who will be allowed to see the communication but not to heat the consultations. With this, the petition is allowed.

Munshi Ahsan Kabir said My lord, we have received documents of prosecution on 8th February and it is not possible for us to read 6680 pages within thist short time. Therefore, we seek an adjournment order from the court. And my lord, it is my first application for adjournment Order before the court.

Then 11th March 2012 was then fixed for Ali Ahsan Mujahid’s matter.

After this the court read out the order relating to Gholam Azam bail application. To read that, go to this post.

About Me

This is a personal blog, and any views are solely mine. I am a Bangladesh based journalist who has since August 2010 worked as Editor, Special Reports for the Bangladesh national newspaper, New Age (see my other blog on the International Crimes Tribunal in Bangladesh: http://bangladeshwarcrimes.blogspot.com) Prior to working at New Age, between March and September 2010, I worked as a senior editor and reporter at the news website, bdnews24.com and before that I spent seven months at the Bangladesh newspaper, the Daily Star, setting up a small investigations unit. Between 2000 and 2009, I was the Executive Director of the Centre for Corporate Accountability, a UK based not-for-profit organisation concerned with workplace safety. Before that, I worked as a Television journalist and producer for about seven years working mainly for the television production company, Twenty Twenty Television in London. In 1995, I was involved in making the Royal Television Society award winning Channel Four documentary, the 'War Crimes File', a film about war crimes allegedly committed by three men during the 1971 War of Indpendence. I have lived in Dhaka since 2003.